Category: THOUGHTS

Carl Jung on the Psychology of People Who Cut off Family and the D.G. Kaye Experience

Published on by dgkaye99 Comments

I’ve been listening a lot lately to some of the works and essays of Carl Jung. Recently, I was listening to his thoughts on people who choose to cut off family for the betterment of their health, and because this is something that happened to me, I found it resonated well. For those of you who’ve read some of my earlier books on growing up with a narcissistic mother and emotional abuse, you may appreciate why this resonated with me.

If someone hasn’t worn the shoes of living stuck in a toxic environment and finally finding the courage to exit, they shouldn’t judge others. Jung says, “It is not weakness, but strength that helps us leave a toxic relationship.” Many choose to blame the person who exits a relationship without understanding the daily hell that person lives through being emotionally battered.

The fixer, the golden child, the blacksheep, whichever noun chosen, is a common target of the narcissistic mother. Family doesn’t always know us, we are who they need us to be, sometimes with no understanding of who we really are. Cutting out family is typically not impulsive, as Jung says, “It’s death by a thousand cuts.” After what can be a lifetime of hurt, after clarity strikes for the final time, I finally chose self and sanity. I love that Jung quotes this as, “Chosen bonds are stronger than biological accidents, the blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb.”

Guilt operates on many levels – surface guilt, suffering in silence. And I can say that it stays quietly, despite the need for that separation. Staying in toxic situations doesn’t only hurt us, it carries down to next generation. Walking away is healing despite how it seems to outsiders. The world doesn’t understand self-preservation until our own is attacked. We are taught family comes first always. Society tell us to forgive and endure. But why should we stay in abuse when those who are supposed to protect us are our abusers?

Family estrangement is a choice to end a connection. It is pain that has reached the point of the last straw that fell, which finally invites the awakening. When you grow up mostly walking on eggshells, you learn young how to read a room, leaving us questionning why the people who are supposed to love us the most, hurt us most.

Some relationships will not move no matter what is done. After all the discussions, words of forgiveness, and many unfulfilled promises by the abuser, we learn we can’t change a sick person single handedly. We are not the fixers. It’s time to go. When the result is the same every time we try to make things better, the balance is off and the cycle repeats. But once we leave, the weight lifts, but don’t be fooled because the grief remains for what we no longer have – or sometimes, never had.

Judgments come. People who know nothing about emotional abuse preach how we only get one family, telling us we must go back. But what if you feel you aren’t part of or never felt like part of that family? Leaving is a painful choice, but less painful in the long run as we rebuild our lives and take care of ourselves.

Family isn’t always blood. Family are the people who stand by us through good times and bad. They offer their ears and compassion. But sometimes they don’t. Good relationships have love and care and concern. This goes for both – blood relationships and no blood relationship.Blacksheep often become happier and healthier when removing themselves from toxic environments and people. I know I surely did. There is no rule stating because we are blood we are condemned to taking abuse from someone for the rest of our life. The choice is ours, and ours alone. The heart and soul know when capacity has been reached from hurt. No other person can gauge that for us, and also has no right to judge.

Cutting contact isn’t necessarily about hating someone, it’s about self-preservation. Also, you can still love someone and not be in their presence. Sometimes we have to prune the family tree to either, stunt the growth of rot, or to give it a new life to grow stronger new branches.

It takes more strength to leave than stay. The estrangement road to healing can be a long road, but the healing price that overcomes us is worth the price of the journey. When you can look back on your life and see growth instead of continuing to minimize ourselves to fit in or appease, that’s peace.

The family curse ends when it’s cut off and when self-love begins, with the courage to walk away. I chose healing over pretense and hurt. Hurting people on purpose isn’t an accident, it’s a conscious decision. And blood or no blood, NOBODY should have to stick around it and endure – not a child, a spouse or even a stranger should have to put up with anybody’s verbal abuse – whether it’s from a parent or anyone else! So thank you Carl Jung for understanding this from the victim’s point of view instead of condemning.

Have you ever had to finally walk away from a toxic relationship or environment?

©DGKaye2026

film projector movie

Are Writers Tougher Movie Critics?

Published on by dgkaye81 Comments

I am best off watching movies alone. I know this, and have been told this. 🤣, from time-to-time. I have a lot to say when I’m watching TV, even if alone, and some people just prefer to watch silently and don’t appreciate my analysis while watching. 😂

Today I’m talking about issues that bother me when watching a movie or series. I notice that bad or ‘sloppy’ writing can show up clearly sometimes when we’re watching movies or a series – not just in books, and I have seen a lot of it in the many series I stream.

I can tell when watching a series if a different writer than previous episodes wrote an episode. One clue for me is a different vibe I get from the odd character to confirm my suspicions; I always check the credits and discover a change in writers. I’m a stickler for paying close attention to continuity. You all may remember the big controversy decades ago when the movie Ben Hur was made and it was stated that one of the Roman chariot drivers was wearing a WRIST WATCH! Yes, it happens! Things get missed. This is why there are people with jobs on set to watch for continuity. Or are there anymore?

My pet peeves on the topic are: crappy unsettled endings, and the so much filler ( I call timesuck) I find in watching many Netflix series. It’s not much different than reading a book and we find ourselves scanning through the filler prose, which sometimes looks as though the added fluff serves to up wordcount.

For example, at the start of most movies or series, we must watch through first five minutes of someone walking, or driving, or more of these situations until a single word is spoken. Some might say, the lag sets the tone, but I say, that often, that meaningless first five minutes doesn’t set anything because we’ve yet to discover what the movie is about. Sure, the writers may look at it as creating ‘tension’ or ‘anticipation’, but I typically fast forward to where the dialogue begins when I’m bored of camera-panning. Yes, no doubt, my opinion is subjective, but I’m willing to bet I’m not alone here. I find it slows down the narrative for me, while I’m sure others may enjoy the anticipation.

For me, when watching an exciting thriller show, I want to be kept in suspense, along with all my guessing, but not discovering the what or who until near the end. The best part for me is guessing who the culprit is, and discovering I was wrong. That demonstrates some crafty suspense writing.

Now, I do realize that some filler are meant to share some backstory, introduce characters or relationships made reference to, but if it holds no real relevance to the show, perhaps it can be cut. But yes, there’s also the time element that these shows should have to fit. If a movie is two hours long (as was pretty much standard decades ago), or a series episode is 45 minutes long, things must fit into the time allotment, hence, why I believe some films add this filler.

I don’t mind fillers when they’re advancing a plot or sharing a secret with us, which is important to character development, or even just to arise my suspense; but filler that adds nothing to the story, especially in the opening, can sometimes feel like a waste of my valuable time just because the writer had to fill a time gap.

What about you my movie or series-watching readers? Do you pay close attention and sometimes scrutinize movies or series you watch?

©DGKaye2025

Thoughts

Through the Ages and Values

Published on by dgkaye90 Comments

There’s an old saying – what goes round comes back. From fashions to morals to war, it seems everything recycles.

When I was a kid, my paternal grandparents were frugal, even with having enough money to not have to worry, and my not comprehending why when they had enough of it they were still frugal. Now in this era of stealthier times, many of us are feeling the pinch in every direction from rents, taxes, food, and really, basic living. And these flashbacks of the past remind that leaner times are back for many.

When we’re younger we don’t realize, or often, don’t wish to even learn, about the financial struggles of our ancestors that eventually got them to their bountiful lives. We often take for granted the here and now and all we have, without realizing what generations before us endured just to get by, sometimes taking for granted what our generations of family endured to evolve into the lifestyles they lived in today’s world.

My paternal grandfather used to tame my desires of asking for toys by re-telling me stories of his meager beginnings when he first came to Canada, and about how he got a job carrying pails of water up a hill for fifty-cents a day as one of his first jobs after coming to Canada, escaping the pogroms of Russia, trying to teach me that money doesn’t grow on trees and reminding that money is hard-earned. My smart-ass replies to him were usually retorts reminding him we live in modern days now and that he’s living well with his own business and he no longer carries those pails, adding we live in modern times now. He knew well that what did a child know who never lacked for anything, I could feel his unspoken thought. I had no interest in past history then and obviously, I knew no value for a dollar. What did I even know about survival when I’d never had to worry about it.

But as I got older and enjoyed all the modern luxuries of life, it never sank in when I was younger just how far our familiar generations had come, how they survived war and hunger, and how they risked the not knowing of what’s to come but soldiered on with plans to come to a land offering freedom and possibilities for a better future. Sadly, being a somewhat spoiled child, it never dawned on me to think about the old values my grandfather upheld despite his successes. And sadly, until I got much older, I couldn’t fathom and wasn’t interested in my grandparents’ history. How I wish I’d asked more questions as I got older but I grew up with a lot of angst with my grandparents and never felt comfortable around them, which kept me emotionally distanced from them.

It’s funny how life must take effect and we are reminded only then about the past and our familiar generations and how their struggles become more interesting to us only as we age and find our own way into the world, realizing that life can change on a dime and learning that the value of a dollar is very important to surviving and thriving. Sadly, it’s usually only when life doles out harder times that we are reminded about being grateful for the so many things we have and so often take for granted.

Is Time Really Flying Faster?

Published on by dgkaye94 Comments

Time flies. I find myself saying this more and more. And I’m not the only one! The old saying ‘time flies’ comes from the Latin – ‘tempus fugit’.

Do you feel like time is passing much faster than it is? Is this our imagination or is it really going faster? Well, it seems to me anyone who mentions time also feels it is passing faster than before – but is it?

A common answer I found in my search to find if time is indeed moving faster said our brains can only process so much as we age. I’m not sure I can agree with that unless of course, someone’s brain is medically challenged. An aging brain is the reason for our perception of time? No proof, but food for thought.

When we were kids, looking forward to an upcoming event, it seemed like eons to a child waiting for that time to pass. Why? Why are children always wishing time away, and those of us middle-aged and more, feel like the days pass much too quickly?

Is it because as life passes by and we accumulate so many memories from our experiences and looking back on them make us feel they were so long ago leaving us to realize that each time fracture that has occurred in our lives makes what time we feel we have left feel smaller? Take a look at the video below where a man shares his theory about why time seems to pass faster as we age:

This man’s theory is demonstrated using circles of time for the amount of years we’ve lived on earth describing how it affects our feeling that time is passing faster:

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I do know how quickly time flies when using digital devices – especially when on computer. I can be doing a twenty minute project that turns into over an hour because of digital hiccoughs that weren’t planned in that time allotment.

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The earth is spinning faster now and actually speeding up, but it is possible to slow down again. BBC Earth uses a climate change example to demonstrate why time shrinks and expands:

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Someone else shares that “It’s not time that speeds up but our psychological perception changes due to increased stress, and the demands of modern life . . .” are what make us feel time is going faster:

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Honestly, I did some searching around to find if the feeling of time passing faster is indeed true, and most of what I came across were same thoughts or theories from most as I’ve shared on the above videos. Maybe it does make sense since life is getting busier with our to-do lists, maybe we’re just feeling that time is going faster. On another note, scientists seem to relay the time speeding up due to climate change, demonstrating how the melting glaciers have a play in why time passes too fast. Or just maybe the guy from video #1’s perception makes a whole lot of sense – Each successive year leaves us with a smaller percentage of time left.

I think how a clock measures time and how we perceive time are quite different.

What do you think?

P.S. I would just like to note that we are now, once again in mercury retrograde for the month of August. Reminder to double check everything, plan ahead, and expect lots of technical glitches and mishaps. On another note, I have noticed in my many blog reading travels and leaving comments that I haven’t been receiving replies from some of those blogs, which is unusual. A few blog friends have told me they found me in their spam. So I just wanted to let you know that if you’re used to seeing me around your blog, and think you haven’t seen me around in a while, please check your spam. Thanks 💜

©DGKaye2024

Writing brain

Why We Love Memoirs

Published on by dgkaye86 Comments

I’m going to step out of my author box for a moment and disregard the fact that I too write memoirs. What is it about memoirs that attract readers – stories involving other people’s lives? It always fascinated me since I was a teenager about people and incidence. I didn’t have to be related to or friends with the people in these memoirs to be curious about their lives, their adventures, their situations and how they overcame them. Yet, once I began writing memoirs myself, my worrisome side kept nagging at me, why would anyone care about the things I experienced in my life when they didn’t even know me? Readers who have no connections to the writers, yet, are fascinated with memoirs. Why?

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Memoir may be a story about incidence in one person’s life, but its value is in the situations the book presents and lessons taken from, shared with readers who somehow identify with our stories. So many people can relate to memoirs because so many encounter same, or like, situations in their own lives, leaving them curious to learn how the memoirist grew from and resolved same issues. The writer doesn’t have to be famous in order for the reader to have interest. Sure, top traditionally published writers get so much more exposure, but that doesn’t mean their stories are superior to an Indie’s books. We all live lives. And if we can write our stories in an engaging way to take the reader in along with story, that is the magic.

Once upon a time, memoirs were much more in a niche category. One had to enjoy nonfiction, and not everybody was interested in the lives or happenings of people they didn’t know. I feel when more sensationalist ‘true’ stories, confessions, more daring on TV and talkshows, documentaries on any subject, all came along, people became more informed about real things that happen to people, and curiosities grew about wanting to find out more about the people they’d been hearing about. I also feel, as the world progressed and illnesses, abuse, sex, et al, became more prevalent in public, people became more fascinated and interested, and considered memoirs as more of self-help for their own issues. Issues that identified with things they themselves were or had experienced. I know it was like that for me. Curiosity grew as I was always an observant soul from as far back as I can remember.

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Many memoir readers have faced some sort of dilemma or adversity and look for stories as hope that it is possible for them to get resolution. There is hope. The authenticity of real life can be refreshing and compelling for readers seeking genuine stories and emotions. Besides the concept of the story, memoir is a personal telling, and it’s the voice of the author that dictates the mode of story.

Memoirs don’t always have to be serious. In fact, readers enjoy some injected humor to lighten the tone and narrative of story. Memoirs often provoke retrospection in the reader, causing them to reflect on their own situations, choices and beliefs.

We have much to learn from each other.

©DGKaye2024

I am Me. Are You Always the Same You?

Published on by dgkaye94 Comments

Are you always your authentic self or do you have different personnas for different environments?

Do you alter your voice for different people or when in different settings?

Are you quieter around some people and bolder around others? Or are you just you, the same you all the time no matter who you’re with or where you are? Now, I’m not referring to toning down ourselves for a situation such as, we’re in church so we have to whisper. That doesn’t alter who we are just because we lowered our voice. I’m referring to our personalities. Often, people change their characters or personality to fit in with their surroundings, either because they feel pressured (from outside influences, or their own pressure put upon themselves).

I am me. Often, when I meet people in person who I’d previously only spoken to on phone or online and when we meet, they tell me I’m just how I sound. My bubbly personality is my usual mode (when I’m not in grieving mode). Those who know me and/or my books, know that I am the same me whether I’m talking on my blog, social media, or writing a book. Of course, I’m a nonfiction author, meaning all my stories are my truth. So naturally, my writing will sound the same everywhere, even in comments. But in everyday life, and certainly on social media, many people disguise their real personality.

Some people try to be someone they’re not, especially when trying to impress another, or perhaps because they feel insecure around someone who may be more well-known or popular, or perhaps when around an authority type. Others may become shrinking violets around stronger personalities, whereas, others may come off as bullyish when they can’t take the spotlight.

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I am me

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I’ll use my mother, who was a staunch narcissist, as an example of switching characters:

My mother had a special, what me and my siblings used to refer to as her ‘pretendy’ voice. My mother had a constant need to be the most popular, the most beautiful, the absolute center of attention anywhere she went, and often, she’d lie and pretend to be more than who she was if opportunity struck. When she was around people she wanted to impress, she’d use ‘that’ voice. It drove us kids crazy. Her inauthenticity never failed to catch our attention, and quietly, me and my siblings would chuckle and give each other the eyeroll when our mother went in ‘performance’ mode. In these instances, her voice would go up an octave when introduced to or introducing someone, especially with one who had lots of money. My mother was always trying to impress anyone who would fawn over her.

As I grew up I studied my mother since I was a young child. When I was very young, I idolized my mother because I felt like I was living with a movie-star-like mother. But once I turned six or seven, I became a quick-study. I began to realize that how my mother treated my father wasn’t right. And by the time I was eleven, I was so on to her. I’d already lived so much under her rule by then, I watched and listened intensely to her behavior. I realized she had a whole ‘nother side to her personality, a very manipulative one. And I knew that she was fearless and would stoop to anything to get her way for anything she wanted to have or do.

I used my mother as an example of how people’s behaviors demonstrate how and who they are. Not everyone is always their authentic selves. But as it turned out in my case, I was lucky I was intuitive and observant because looking back, I can see how easy it could have been to become a follower instead of learning how not to be like her. I took the higher road in life and have no regrets. I learned how important it was to be authentic, never wanting to become a phony like my mother was. And most likely, my growing up life was inspired by my young life, which helped shape me to become authentic, one who learned to call out bullshit and injustice, and ultimately, a writer who is compelled to speak truth.

I suppose I could easily have become a fictional writer, given the colorful background of my young life, where escape stories were my go to. But as I grew older, I chose to write about truth in my stories instead of hiding them under the cover of fiction.

“Be yourself, everyone else is taken.” – Oscar Wilde

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I am me. Are you, you?

©DGKaye2023

Life Love Loss

Goodbye my Friend – In Memorium

Published on by dgkaye77 Comments

In memorium to my brother-in-law ‘Bill’ – William Gies who left a void September 13, 2022 – a legend in his time. ❣

Rest in peace my lovely brother-in-law. I will miss our conversations, and your checking up on me every few weeks as a dutiful brother-in-law and friend, and all the laughter we shared for years in our monthly card club get togethers, parties, picnics, and Christmases in those so very golden days.

©DGKaye2022

Life Love Loss

Damaged Goods, Warranties, Humor, and the Love of My Life

Published on by dgkaye103 Comments

Damaged Goods –

A popular slang term for a person with a ravaged past, incident, or reputation – no longer perfection. Aren’t we all damaged in some way? Hard to think that anyone has sailed through life unscathed by hurt, pain, or inappropriate abuse. We don’t have to experience physical pain to feel abused  – mental, or emotional, abuse can appear in all forms.

My husband used to joke around with me because three days after we were married, I wound up in hospital – on and off for three months because they couldn’t figure out what was wrong with me, thinking it was a cancer that turned out to be hard to diagnose Crohns disease. No, it wasn’t funny then, but through the years, I had a few other scares, and throughout our marriage when all was well, my humorous husband used to like to say to our friends that he married damaged goods. He’d add to that, in true used car salesman talk, he married a lemon and it was too late to give her back because the warranty had expired.

Yes, that was my husband, always full of humorous slogans. Yes, I can laugh, and so can you, because my husband loved me to the nth degree and would move heaven and earth for anything that would make me happy. I lacked for nothing and never asked for anything, because I didn’t have to. He was always willing to give anything of himself. And he always did.

Damaged goods isn’t an endearing term by any means, typically it is referred to as a product we’ve bought that failed to live up to its projected expectations. Not so pretty when used to refer to a person’s state of being. My Honey had a joke for everything between us, and that’s why we laughed together every single day we were together. Life isn’t always funny, but if you can look past the painful parts and find a way to make light of things, it helps to lighten the load. Having unconditional love allows for such jokes, without that, a comment like that would sound abusive.

My husband had so many funny sayings. He was also always full of surprises. Every year or so he’d come home and inform me that he sold my car again. This was his department not mine. I knew that when he found a happy paying customer to buy a car he didn’t have on the lot for him, but he had one his wife was driving, of course, in mint condition, it was time to sell and make a profit. It became like a side business for him because all my cars were bought at wholesale price, and sold for retail. Getting a new car didn’t cost us anything and we’d buy a newer model. He had always warned me to never get attached to ‘things’.

One day he came home from work while I was sitting outside with a neighbor. He got out of his car, came up to me and gave me a kiss as he did every single day of our lives together, then told me to clean out my car, it was going tomorrow. I’d lament as I always did once I got attached to a car, reminding him how much I loved it and didn’t need a new one. The logic would repeat, he’d laugh and add, “Now Cubby, make sure you don’t stand on this driveway because you can be sold too.” Lol, I always remembered that one. As if! He loved to give the neighbors a laugh, pretending to be the guy with authority when anyone who knew us, knew that it was I who always had the final say. But I let him get his glory moments in, and we’d both burst out laughing at the mere conception that he’d ever give me away for any price.

I miss that man more than I could ever write. My heart breaks daily again everyday I wake up without him, and the painful longing for his embrace and love. I try to keep focusing on our funny moments to overshadow the black hole that resides within me, there were so many moments. It’s a Herculian task to say the least, to struggle daily with missing my other half of me. My husband joked a lot about my being damaged goods, but little did he know that’s exactly how I feel now without him. And there are no jokes possible to lighten this load. But one thing is for sure, the warranty on my love for him will never expire.

Big Puppy

©DGKaye2022